Jefferson Davis Quote

What security have you for your own safety if every man of vile temper, of low instincts, of base purpose, can find in his own heart a higher law than that which is the rule of society, the Constitution, and the Bible? These higher-law preachers should be tarred and feathered, and whipped by those they have thus instigated. This, my friends, is what was called in good old revolutionary times, Lynch Law. It is sometimes the very best law, because it deals summary justice upon those who would otherwise escape from all other kinds of punishment.


Speech in New York, 1858.


What security have you for your own safety if every man of vile temper, of low instincts, of base purpose, can find in his own heart a higher law...

What security have you for your own safety if every man of vile temper, of low instincts, of base purpose, can find in his own heart a higher law...

What security have you for your own safety if every man of vile temper, of low instincts, of base purpose, can find in his own heart a higher law...

What security have you for your own safety if every man of vile temper, of low instincts, of base purpose, can find in his own heart a higher law...